PRODUCE REQUISITION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17275, 26 September 1919, Page 7

PRODUCE REQUISITION.

VALUE TO THE DOMINION.

OUTPUT OF FROZEN MEAT.

ADVOCACY OF EXTENSION.

Reference to the Government purchase of the primary products of the Dominion was made yesterday by Mr. S. J. Ambury at the annual meeting of the Auckland Farmers' Freezing Company. He said that while he believed in the general principle of free markets, he did not join with those who were dissatisfied with the Government requisition of our primary products. He considered that if it had not been for the Government contracts for the purchase of primary products, the country would have been lees prosperous than it was at present. In view of the liberal advances regu.arly made by the Government, and the substantial amounts paid for storage, the people of the Dominion should recognise aDd appreciate what had been done in the interests of all classes.

" Incidentally, what a boon it would have been to the country," said Mr. Ambury, " if the Government had fixed the price of land for the period of the war, as .well as the prices of the products ot the land. here would have been more producers, fewer land speculators and land agents and greater contentment than there is at present."' Dealing with the suggestion to extend the period of the meat requisition for a year after the expiration of the present term, Mr. Ambury said he was pleased to see he was not alone in the desire to have the contract extended. Many of the Southern buying companies had expressed the same wish, and this was significant, in view of the fact that these companies had agencies in England, and understood tha conditions governing the Home markets. Though the shipping facilities had not been all that could have been desired, continued Mr. Ambury, they had been better than many people had dared hope foe in the circumstances, and had it not been for the Government control the producers' difficulties would have been much greater than they had been. He did not hold a brief for any Government, but having been so closely associated with the snipping difficulties of the last four years, he had learned to appreciate other people's efforts, and not magnify his own troubles.